The Family Circus: Family Crisis
by Gothenheim.J
Summary: After a failed pregnancy, trouble looms ahead for the family. Characters copyright their original owners.
1. Chapter 1

The Family Circus: Family Crisis

Bill sat on the edge of the bed, his fingers pressed against his head. He had one hell of a headache.

There was nothing he could do. They'd lost the baby. Thel had withdrawn—grown distant. Ever since they'd come back from the hospital nothing had been right between them. She lay curled up on the other side of the bed.

"Are you gonna sit there all night?" she shot at him without raising her head "Why don't you be a man and say what you really think? That it was my fault? Why don't you be a man, Bill?"

Bill said nothing. He'd had enough of her pity parade. Wordlessly he shoved his body off of the edge of the bed and stalked with the deliberation that comes with impotent anger into the living room. Advancing to the cupboard, he threw open the doors and grabbed a bottle of scotch.

Little Billy and Jeffy were both awake. Billy looked at his brother with a sense of worriment. "Jeffy," he said, "I'm scared. Mom and Dad are angry. I don't know what's gonna happen."

Jeffy murmured, almost to himself "It's cause Mom lost the baby. I hope she finds it soon."

Billy bit his lip to stop himself from screaming at his brother, the heat of anger growing inside of him. He was far too old for such childish naivety. He knew anger served nothing, however. He made certain to sound gentle. "No, Jeffy. The baby isn't lost. It's dead. Like grandpa." He felt a pang of bitterness stab his heart. "The baby's with grandpa now. I'm sure he's taking good care of it in Heaven." Billy cursed himself even as he said these words. Even at his young age, he knew that the mercy of God was a lie.

Suddenly, a shadow stumbled into the room and with a crash it slumped into the frame of the door. It was Bill Sr., drunk out of his mind.

"Billy, if there's any justice in this world, your grandfather is buried head-first in the deepest part of Hell!"

Jeffy started to cry. Bill took a swig from his bottle of scotch. Jeffy's blubbering angered him. "Stop that racket!" he smashed the bottle against the floor and stood up.

"Now look at what you've made me do! Now look at what you've made me do!" and he balled his hand into a fist. He would have punched his son in his jaw if the crying hadn't woken up Dolly.

"Why's Jeffy crying?" Dolly asked, "Is he hungry? I want some momcorn!" she said, smiling at the cleverness of her pun.

Bill would have nothing of it. The sight of his daughter, her voice, her insufferable punning. "Shut up, you festering cunt! You'll grow up to be quite the little whore, won't you! Oh yeah, all the boys'll love you, and I'll have to pretend not to mind it, not to mind it when you spread your legs for anyone who's got a fast car or can score you a bag of weed! Jesus, just look at your piggish little face! Oh, I can tell, I can tell—" he was foaming at the mouth "—I can tell already that you'll be one of those girls, one of those horrid little things who boys'll love because they've never seen a real woman! And you'll fall right into it, they'll tell you you're beautiful 'cause they've never seen a fuckin' beauty before, and you'll lead 'em on, 'Oh, no one's ever told me that before'—Jesus Christ you women!—and then you've got them, you've got 'em—just like your mother. Just like your mother." And he began to weep.

Thel heard the commotion, heard her husband's drunken rambling and the screams of Jeffy and Dolly. She rose out of bed and with manifest authority strode down the hall. When she reached the boys' room she spat in disgust at her husband who sat crumpled in the doorway. "You bastard!" she yelled, and kicked him in the back. He rolled over on the ground, and fueled by a drunken rage he stumbled to his feet and clocked Thel in the forehead.

The outraged woman stared at him as the sobering assault of remorse washed over him. "Thel, I—" he started to say.

"Get out of my house!" she erupted in all the pious fury of a violated woman Thel picked up Billy's alarm clock. She threw it at Bill, who ducked and began sobbing. Little Billy lay under his bedsheets, his eyes closed. He was simply listening. He heard the clattering of the alarm clock on the floor. More angry words. Screaming and crying filled his ears. Slamming, stamping of feet. The front door crashed shut. Father was gone.


	2. Chapter 2

Bill looked at the lit cigarette in his hand, mesmerized by the glowing ember. How would this feel against his own flesh? He pressed it against his arm and jolted back in pain. Still a coward. Still not a man.

His apartment was filled with empty bottles of bourbon, beer and vodka. He'd taken to drinking after Thel kicked him out. His eyes were assaulted by the miasma of bitter drunkenness and they wheeled wildly in his head. His mouth filled with vomit, but he choked it back down. Above all, he needed a blowjob.

From under a stack of papers—bills, eviction notices, an envelope containing the last check he'd gotten before being fired for coming to work drunk—he lifted a thick yellow book, its pages mottled with stain.

He thumbed through the grimy tome, its pages stuck together; he desperately tore them apart, and found the number he was looking for. He picked up the receiver and dialed the number—thank God they hadn't taken away his phone yet!—and he let out a low, hoarse laugh.

Thel had brought home another strange man. Billy, Jeffy and Dolly sat in the living room eating their microwaved dinners as the man entertained their mother in her chamber. Creaking could be heard from beyond the closed door. Creaking, moaning, laughing; the wet blandishment of kisses. She didn't care they could hear.

Billy looked out the window at the darkling sky. He was happy once. Once he could run all day and night throughout the neighbors' yards as his father watched on. When he got home he would quiz his father on where he'd gone, and Bill always told him his route in exactitude, as though he'd plotted it out on a dotted line. Friendly faces fade as you grow. No longer did the Andersons appreciate his antics. No longer did Auntie June—so they called the old lady at the end of the street—give him candies for coming to visit. Now he saw only distrust and, my god could it be? fear in their eyes when they saw him coming.

Not that he blamed them. He had grown sullen, interior. He carried his hell with him and was himself surprised that flowers did not wilt in his presence. Oh, what a fine thing, youth!

"Do you think Mom's playing pretend with her new friend?" Jeffy chirped cheerfully.

"Don't you know anything?" came Dolly's imperious reply, "They're playing House! I heard Mom and the man talking about getting a condo!"

"That's condom, Dolly." Billy said, annoyed. "And you don't want to know what they're doing in there." And he rose to find PJ and give him his supper.

Mindy opened the door to the apartment and drew back instinctively from the stench. Even a whore has standards. She spied the shine of a thousand bottles lying on the ground. A man was standing amidst them, shirtless. "You must be Mindy." he said. She entered, closing the door behind her softly.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Bill leaned back in his recliner and let the soft leather push against his skin. He was content, and smiled broadly. Little Billy ran into the room and hugged his father, looking up into his face with eyes filled with wonderment. Bill laughed and set the pipe he was smoking between his teeth, then rustled his son's hair. Thel came out of the kitchen. "Supper's ready, honey!" she said with a smile. God damn, she was sexy in her tight black pants and homey old red sweater. Nothin' sexier than domesticity, Bill thought with a laugh.

"We're havin' roast beast!" Dolly exclaimed. Bill smirked. Another one of her Dollyisms.

"Here comes the airplane!" Thel waved the small spoon about in the air and accentuated her game with P.J. by blowing a raspberry while the small child chortled away.

---

"Shit!" There was a sudden jolt of pain to Bill's temple. His eyes opened by reflex and he groaned from the invasion of sudden light. He was lying on the sidewalk, covered only by a newspaper he'd found in a dumpster last night. A man and a woman looked down at him, obviously concerned. 

"Jesus, I didn't see you there, buddy—hey, you're alright, right?" the man looked about nervously and fumbled in his pockets "Look, here's a twenty." The crumpled paper passed between them. "Get yourself something nice to eat; I didn't see you there, guy, Hey, again man, I'm sorry. Your head's alright?" Bill nodded and the man turned to his companion—obviously his girlfriend.

Bill glared at her without meaning to, but out of sheer animal desperation. He needed to feel the touch of a woman. He licked his lips, imagining what it would be like to slide his hands, caked with grime and dirt and funk as they were, up her silky little blouse, to just grab onto those tits and to root around her neck, draped in sweet-smelling auburn hair, covering it in shameless kisses; biting, then ever so gently at her earlobe, bringing his hands down across her belly, lower…

Noticing his perverse leer, she started and looked back awkwardly at him, obviously disgusted but too polite to show it. She grabbed for her boyfriend's hand and the couple walked away briskly. Bill looked down at the 20 dollar bill in his hand. It was more than enough to get him plastered.

---

Thel looked out the window and felt bitterness in her heart. It had been a long time coming, her kicking Bill out. So long pretending to be a happy family. She'd known about his indiscretions and said nothing. What's more, he'd always been lousy in bed. Too over-eager, too quick and to-the-point, no sense of romance or sensuality. They just fucked. She laughed a little to herself. She should look up one of those young girls and swap stories about Bill with them. Doubtless they hated him as much as she did. But she was afraid. What if they got to talking, and she found out he was an excellent lover to them? What if the problem lay with her after all? "That would just be more reason to hate him," she whispered aloud.

Drawing up her legs she felt a pang of guilt. She knew she was neglecting the children, but she couldn't look at them without seeing his features in them. Isn't that why she sent them over to their grandmother's tonight? She couldn't stand the sight of them. She saw the cruelty in it, the monstrousness of a mother who could not bear to acknowledge the fruits of her womb, and yet she couldn't help it. That's why she had known so many men after she kicked Bill out: to forget what he felt like, what he looked like. But she couldn't. She couldn't forget him. Was it because she still loved him? No. The opposite. She felt nothing but a deep-seated hatred for the man who had robbed her of so many years of her life—the hypocrite who expected perfection from her and none from himself. Losing the baby wasn't the problem. It was just the match that lit the keg.

---

Bill shambled along the street, his mouth puckered when he felt the taste of copper on his tongue. What the fuck was wrong with him? Whatever it was, drinking would make him forget. He followed the sound of trashy blues wavering in the air from a distant bar somewhere and held his arms deep against his own chest, jealously guarding the twenty he held crumpled up in a death-grip. He spat at the ground to exorcise the sickness in him and walked on.


	4. Chapter 4

CHAPTER 4

Drying her tears on the edge of her sleeve, Thel got up and swept up to the door, bracing herself. The children were back. She opened the door and they paraded in, followed by their grandmother and the bluster of a dewy night-breath from the open air. Conversation with no meaning for her followed—yes, the azaleas were coming up nicely—no, Frank hadn't said anything about that—oh she didn't? I'd heard she did—while the children went into their bedrooms for the night.

"Jeffy," Billy called to his brother, "Jeffy I need someone to talk to."

"Whatsamatter, Billy?" Jeffy's shining lips were covered in his own saliva.

"Mom's collapsing, Jeffy. Mom's collapsing, and there's nothing I can do. Dad's gone, and I don't know where he is. I thought things would get better eventually, but they're not—they're just getting worse! Do you see it, too?"

"Dogs are gross! I saw Barfy eat his own puke today!" Christ, useless as always.

"Why do ya think we call him Barfy, dummy!" their sister's voice rang from down the hall.

---

Bill staggered into the dimly lit bar-room. Wispy smoke danced in the air like an arabesque come to life, and the braying of a saxophone rang in his ears. He was in Hell, but he was comfortable. Misery loves company.

Suddenly he became aware of himself. The grime all over him would be hidden by the light, but he couldn't hide the stench. He hastily tucked in his shirt and ran his fingers through the wilds of his hair. At best he looked like a busy guy, hard on his luck, who hadn't had time to shave in a week. It'd take a closer examination for someone to see he was a vagrant.

He looked around for a seat. The glowing eyes of lit cigarettes shot at him through the darkness. The devils of the pit. The wild wail of the saxophone was a black paean that broke over his consciousness, sent the swirling ghosts of smoke into his eyes and made him cough and sputter. The only seat was one right next to the stage.

---

Thel lay silent in her bed and gathered the sheets around herself. She buried her face into her pillow to muffle her gasps of pleasure-mingled sorrow, and then she traced the curve of her thigh with her hand and entered herself; forcefully, angrily, biting down on the tear-streaked fabric of the pillow that surrounded her face.

---

Bill was on his second drink of good cheap liquor when it happened. The room suddenly became silent and dark—even darker than before. Then, on the stage, a white light rose slowly, illuminating first a single microphone stand, then the columns of against the wall and the gently swaying velvet drapery that framed the scene. The lit cigarettes became burning cherubim. The tortured ghosts were empyrean clouds. Bill looked into his glass in a daze and then he heard it.

The song was of a totally different character than the chaotic up and down of the jazzman who had just finished. This was ethereal, otherworldly. Bill looked up and through his reddening eyes he saw a figure in sparkling white. He was entranced with her, this beautiful angel singing, it seemed, only to him. Her song was sad, unmeasured but forceful and pleasant, like a gentle breeze in springtime. The notes rose sometimes unexpectedly, and when they did so they lifted his heart with them.

When love is gone away

Then speak to me, and

Never say that I--

And you and I could

Go on forever.

I lie upon the shore

Of a misty lake at night;

Where my body lies,

Lies too a mystery of life.

And love is gone away

When you speak to me, so

Never say that I--

And you and I could

Go on forever.

I'll lie here 'til dawn--

Oh hold me, I'm falling!--

Wond'ring to myself

How the mysteries of life--

Unhappy as I am,

Seem never nearer to my heart.

An unseen source of music filled the silence as she ended the stanza and prepared to begin the next, when Bill began to wail and grope at the stage, crying piteously "Hold me! Hold me, oh God!" over and over. The singer looked at him contemptuously and pulled back her leg just as he vomited a thin yellow liquid mixed with blood. Bill Keane screamed and choked on his own bile as the other patrons rose to their feet. He cried out "Hold me!" again and then vomited once more. This time it was mostly blood. It bubbled from his mouth and poured over his ragged beard. A gruff looking man grabbed Bill by the collar of his shirt and dragged him into the street. Had he not noticed the blood? The lights in the bar were dim. Couldn't he see how sick he was? Bill grappled with the man and pulled wildly at the pockets of his pants. The man, disgusted, threw Bill down and went back inside.

Bill staggered to his feet and vomited a third time. Chunks of something were mixed into it this time, even though he hadn't eaten solid food in over a day. He rolled his eyes upward, waiting for the pressure to go away. Suddenly he noticed he was holding onto something. It was a gun. Had he taken it from that man? Yes, he'd had a gun lodged in his belt.

Bill looked it over. The man would realize he was missing his weapon soon. He'd have to get away from the area. But where would he go? He smiled a black smile, his mouth and clothes spattered with frothy heart's-blood. He laughed a short, low laugh.

He was going home.


	5. Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5

A scratching at the window woke Thel from her sleep. She looked out from under the heavy lids of her eyes and saw nothing. Something was tapping against the glass. It had stopped. She lay back and closed her eyes once again.

A tumultuous crash. Splintering wood. She sat up this time, alarmed. A figure clothed in darkness was pulling itself through the window frame, tarantula-like. Was she dreaming? She tried to scream, but her throat was stifled. The hunched figure turned to her and she saw its ghastly face, great clots of blood streaming down from its gaping mouth. Its sunken eyes stared, wild, from deep within the sockets of the leaden flesh that barely covered the skull beneath. Hot, ragged, torturous breath shot out staccato from its throat as it groped the edge of her bed.

"Bill?"

"Thel, I need—I need help, Thel. I'm sick, Thel. Can't you see how sick I am?"

The figure jerked with a spasm and spilled a mouthful of vomit onto Thel's bedsheets. In an instant, Thel got up and turned on the lights. Bill stayed standing, supported by the bed.

"God, Bill. You look horrible."

"I need—"

"No, Bill. Don't even bother. You did this to yourself and I'm not going to clean up your messes. Not anymore."

"You did this—"

Thel's voice raised, "What did you think, that coming here and breaking through the window? You could have scared Dolly and Jeffy! For God's sake, Bill, get to a police station or a doctor or something, not me. I don't want to have anything to do with you. You're worthless, Bill! Look at yourself! Look at what you've done to yourself!"

Bill tore open his shirt and stared at his wife.

"Christ. You know what I'll do, Bill? I'll call the police. You can explain to them what a worthless drunk you are; and you can explain to them how you got that blood all over yourself. Myself, I really don't want to know."

Thel started to go out of the room, but Bill caught her with a movement too fast to be expected from someone as sick as he was. The adrenaline that came with desperation and anger fueled him. He hissed into her ear, "No police! It's my blood! No police! My blood! No police!"

Thel struggled against his grip, and that only enraged him further. He threw her upon the bed, and then, to stop her from screaming, clamped his thumbs into her windpipe. Thel gagged and sputtered. He pushed in harder. He threw himself too, upon the bed, pushing down on her body with his own weight. She pushed up against him with her hips, clawing uselessly at his arms; kicking out beneath him with her feet. For several minutes they struggled with each other. Tears welled up in Thel's eyes. She looked out into a half-darkened world, disbelieving. Bill pushed harder and harder into her neck with a growing fury. He saw the capillaries break in her eyes. Thel's cheeks puffed up as her muscles spastically struggled for air. He watched as her tongue swelled through her cheeks. Her kicking slowed, then stopped. Her bloated tongue stopped licking the air. Bill smiled. He was finally a man to her. He lay for some time next to her body, gently rubbing his nose against her now unfeeling cheek.

Bill took the gun out of his jacket pocket. Now their mother was dead. He couldn't leave his children alive. He couldn't let them suffer the pain that life dealt him. His lungs beat out a hoarse laugh.

Bill stalked the halls of his house, scraping one hand against the wall; the other playfully holding the gun in front of him by the bottom of the handle. He opened the door to the nursery and stepped inside. PJ was sleeping soundly in his crib. Bill steadied himself, and aimed the gun at the sleeping infant. The report blasted his ears and instinctively he closed his eyes. When he opened them, he saw PJ's brains splattered against the pillow.

Bill shambled into the next room. Dolly was awake. "Daddy, I heard fireworks! Is it the fourth of July already?" Bill howled a wordless scream and doubled over. He brought up the gun in his hand and fired. Dolly's skull shattered from the force of the bullet. Her ponytail arced through the air like a spinning pinwheel, and her body slumped down, lifeless after it.

Jeffy had barely woken when his father entered the room. Bill took his son into his arms and caressed his head before placing the muzzle of the gun to the child's temple and obliterating it.

Little Billy covered his ears to protect himself from the sound of the blast. His father turned to him.

"Billy. You look so much like I did as a kid. I don't—I don't know, Billy. I'm sorry."

Bill raised the gun and slowly lowered it.

"Dad, why? Why, dad?" Billy was bawling.

"Because I'm a coward, Billy. I'm a coward." Bill placed the gun on his son's bed. "But you're not. You're not a coward. I always knew you'd be—I can't kill you."

Bill looked up at his son whose face was covered in tears. "Don't be like that. No. I got a favor to ask of you. Don't—don't make the same mistakes I did." He picked up the gun again and placed it on his son's lap. "I want you to show me—I want you to show me you're a man. Go ahead, son."

"Dad, I won't—"

"Do it! Do it or I'll kill you like I did the others! Do it! Do it! Show me you're a man! Do it!"

The final report of the gun gave way to silence. Billy sat, shocked, upon the bed. His father lay before him. Barfy began to howl piteously outside. The night went on and dawn came as Billy screamed and screamed.

THE END


End file.
